City Now City Future: Museum of London invites visitors to join a conversation about the past, present and future of our cities in first ever season

16 January 2017

City Now City Future is the Museum of London’s first ever year-long season, exploring the challenges, initiatives and innovations taking place within our cities.

From May 2017 to April 2018, a major programme of exhibitions, creative commissions, large-scale public events, talks and debates invites museum visitors to participate in shaping their cities.

The Museum of London will ask visitors what it means to live in a truly global city, how we experience those things that make city life both attractive and challenging, and imagine how London could change in the future.

“City Now City Future is an extraordinary opportunity to rethink the Museum of London’s place in Londoners’ lives and to accurately reflect life in the capital. Working with artists, thinkers, communities and young people, City Now City Future will explore the issues that matter to Londoners today. As we look to move to West Smithfield by 2022, we’re thinking hard about what a museum for London should be, including what the future could look like for London and its residents, and we’re inviting everyone to join the conversation.”

The City Now City Future season will be split into four waves.

Launch: (mid-May 2017 to mid-July 2017) – the first wave will kick off with a major public launch event and a new space for digital commissions. The first commission will be a new work from Blast Theory which has created a video piece, made in London about London that will take visitors on a journey through a city which is both familiar but strangely alien, posing questions to them about the future.

Playing the City: (mid-July 2017 to end of August 2017) – during the summer months a major family festival, walks, debates and monthly salons will encourage people to explore the city in a playful way.

Doing it Ourselves: (September 2017– December 2017) – the third wave will explore London’s alternatives cultures, celebrate city residents’ ‘do it yourself’ attitude and community actions. Key activities will include an Open Weekender and the launch of a young peoples’ strand for the season, including research clubs and a young ambassador programme.

London Visions: (Jan 2018 - April 2018) – the last and final phase will imagine the future of architecture, politics and technologies in cities and explore what London could look like in 50 or 100 years.

Opening in July 2017 is the museum’s major, free exhibition, The City is Ours. Created by Cité des sciences et de l’industrie in Paris, this interactive dual language exhibition, spread across three of the museum’s galleries, focuses on how urban cities around the world are rapidly evolving, affecting everything from our leisure activities, work life and transport to how we manage urban green spaces and data. It explores the ideas and innovations being developed by urban communities to improve how cities work and people’s experience of living in them.

More information on the season and the free exhibition will be announced over the coming months.

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About The Museum of London

The Museum of London tells the ever-changing story of this great world city and its people, from 450,000 BC to the present day. Our galleries, exhibitions, displays and activities seek to inspire a passion for London and provide a sense of the vibrancy that makes the city such a unique place.

The museum is open daily 10am – 6pm and is FREE to all, and you can explore the Museum of London with collections online – home to 90,000 objects with more being added. www.museumoflondon.org.uk.